College Relations
Salem State hosts national history workshop
March 10, 2005
Contact: Jim Glynn at (978) 542-7519 or james.glynn@salemstate.edu
SALEM, Mass. - Salem State College has been selected as one of 15 sites across the nation to host the Landmarks in American History workshops sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). Salem State College professors Patricia Johnston and Brad Austin will direct the programs providing K-12 educators from across the country three opportunities to immerse themselves in the weeklong study entitled, "Becoming American: Trade, Culture, and Reform in Salem, Massachusetts, 1801-1861."
There are spaces available for all three workshops beginning July 10, 17 and 24. Registration is taking place this month by contacting Pamela Poppe at 978-542-7225 or at ppoppe@salemstate.edu. Registration information is also available on the Web at salemstate.edu/landmark.
The only such program offered in New England this summer, the workshops are designed to strengthen educators' knowledge of the early 19th century and to invigorate their passion for history. Salem provides the ideal location for such an educational experience. From its days as one of the earliest landing sites of the English colonists to its heyday as a thriving hub of American commerce and the home of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Salem's historical legacy is rich. The program is geared toward history teachers, but will also be valuable to literature and art teachers.
The itinerary includes hands-on instruction, walking tours of local historical sites, small group meetings with Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) curators and lectures by members of the Salem State College faculty. Primary sources of information are the diaries of William Bentley, minister of Salem's East Church and a noted scholar and linguist; the journals of Charlotte Forten, the first African American to graduate from the Normal School in Salem and the first northern African-American schoolteacher to go to the south to teach former slaves; the memoirs of Francis Peabody, a wealthy manufacturer with scientific and architectural interests; and numerous speeches and letters of Horace Mann, often called the father of American public school education.
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